Consumers have embraced the convenience of carrying out electronic financial transfers using mobile devices, such as smart phones and tablet computers. At the same time, electronic banking has become susceptible to fraudulent activity, for instance from fraudsters that intercept money transfers by compromising the mobile devices involved in the transfers and/or misdirecting funds into their own fraudulent bank accounts. Traditional methods for mitigating such fraudulent activity include second factor authentication that delivers pin codes via SMS (short message service) text messages, or delivers pin codes via a one-time token from a mobile application on the mobile device. However, such tokens are cumbersome and may only work for previously-registered users. Further, malware may compromise the mobile device and forward SMS messages, intercept voice calls, store and forward voice calls, access cameras, GPS on the phone, and send SMS from the phone, thereby allowing a fraudster to complete the traditional SMS-based validation process. Such fraudulent attacks compromise the security and success of carrying out electronic financial transfers.
There is a need for a more secure validation process. This disclosure is intended to address the above-noted concerns and to provide related advantages.